The Zapdos' Journey
by Zai Redwinters
Summary: When a teenage boy's prototype game console accidentally electricutes him after contracting a strange virus, he finds himself in a very different world, in a very different form... CHAPTER 2 HAS BEEN ADDED!
1. Prologue

**The Zapdos' Journey**

**_Prologue:_ Memories of an Old Life**

_Date:_ **January 23, 2005**

_ For centuries, humans and Pokemon have lived, worked, and played together all over the world. Though, when the Pokemon were tamed by humans is unknown, they have had a strong interaction with each other for as long as any text, document, or drawing has existed. The interaction goes far beyond living together as separate beings but goes as far as the two becoming one…_

_Area:_ **"Abandoned" Warehouse in an undisclosed area of northern New Jersey…**

"Hey, Ninetales, light the fire up some more, would ya?" The beautiful, nine tailed fox Pokemon raised herself onto her legs and lets loose a small fireball at a homemade fireplace, immediately causing the weak flame to flare up. At the same time, I rose from my bed in the corner and walked over to my loyal companion and stroked behind her ears, "Thanks, Nine".

"No problem, Zai" she replied as she nuzzled up against me. Before you wonder how I knew she said that, I'll tell you right now that I can understand any Pokemon's language. Why, you ask? Well, it's a basic thing when you're a hybrid. I've been one since I was about 7 or 8 years old apparently, but to me, it seems like only 3 years since I became one…

_Date: _**February 8, 2002**

_ As far back as we can remember, humans have had to rely on each other to create new and better things, eventually leading to the modern, high-tech society of today. One of the most relaxing past times of this society is video games. For the past three and a half years, a popular game from Japan known as Pokemon, has made itself quite popular worldwide._

_Area: _**The house in a small New Jersey town I once called "home"…**

"Another week of school is finally over! Man, High School just keeps getting tougher, and I'm barely half way done with Freshman Year…" I groaned as I tossed my backpack in the corner of my room, "Boring, too… ever since I beat all those GBA games I got for Christmas, there's been nothing to do. I knew I should've asked for a Gamecube, or something…"

I walked down to the kitchen to find a rather large package on the table. I thought it was something for mom until I looked at the address label and saw it was for me! What was more curious as to what it was, though, was the sender's name and address:

**Nintendo of America Prototype Testing Team**

**Address Undisclosed**

I looked it over quite a few times to make sure I wasn't misreading. "Why would a company like Nintendo send me, of all people, a prototype device? I didn't enter a magazine contest or anything, I think. And why did they send the package without a return address? Especially after all the recent letters with anthrax in them that were sent to various people."

My mom stepped out of the pantry in the back of the kitchen.

"Michael, that package is for you apparently, how was school?"

"The same as it's been for the last 5 months, mom. Boring and annoying."

"Well, it's better than being bad"

"Yeah, you're right… I'm going to go upstairs and see what this package is." I grabbed the box and went back to my room. I grabbed the scissors from my drawer and carefully cut the tape off the box, and peered inside. "What's this…?" I opened the top flaps of the box and pulled out what appeared to be a giant Gameboy Color, with a cartridge slot for a screen, and instead of a cartridge slot on the top, it was a long cable that could attach to the printer port of the computer. "Cool…" I stared at the strange thing in awe for a sec, then pulled out a small book in the box and opened to the front page.

"Congratulations! You've been randomly selected… yadda yadda, play all your multiplayer Gameboy games online… compatible with any computer…" I mumbled to myself, "Nice!"

I flipped the page and read more about the actual product, and then closed the book and observed the device some more. "I still can't believe I was chosen for this kind of thing. Don't they normally have people whose job it is to try these out? Well, I guess I shouldn't complain, since I'm getting this thing free of charge. Where am I supposed to write the review though? Maybe once I try this out, I'll get more information." I picked up my GBA game holder, which had my Crystal Version in it and took it, as well as the device and manual to the computer room.

"This goes here, and I guess the game goes in this… just hook that up to the back of this, disconnect the printer… and, done!" After running a brief tutorial program and getting connected to the server, I had to register info like my name, age, and location. Afterwards, I immediately loaded my favorite duo from my Crystal game to use in short battles. I had spent hours upon hours raising my Zapdos from my old Red Version and my female Ninetales from my old Silver Version to level 100 without the use of Rare Candies, so that I could make the most of their stats.

I connected to the main server to see who else was on, but, not to my surprise, the player's room was empty, probably because the other people who had gotten the prototypes weren't using them yet, or already had used them and signed off. "Oh well," I thought, "maybe tomorrow the other people will be online tomorrow or sometime this weekend…" I made my way to the single player, online battle generator and fought a computer controlled team of two, a Raikou and an Arcanine to see how well my two did against two of the same type. The computer was incredibly hard to beat, and a lot smarter than the players in the actual game pak. After two or so battles of barely winning, and about 10 lost battles, I decided to call it quits for the day, because I was getting unusually tired. As I went to disconnect, the status screen for the adapter said "Virus-A-New-Beginning.exe added to file directory."

"What's that? 'A New Beginning' is that story I was reading a few days ago, I didn't get to finish reading it. Maybe next time… but why is that the name of a file and why does it say virus? Ah… too sleepy now. Sleep first, then worry about this…"

Unfortunately I had to disconnect everything, in case the printer needed to be used by my brother or mom, so I packed everything up and brought it back to my room. I put the online adapter on my desk and am about to lay down when the device starting making a weird beeping noise. I turned around and looked at the device, and then I reached out for it to pick it up and...

"BZZZT!" A large surge of electricity ran through my body and caused an immense amount of pain, so overwhelming I couldn't even scream. I fell over and blacked out as I landed on my bed…

"W…where am I…?" I rubbed my head groggily. I opened my eyes slowly and I saw that I was lying outside, facing the beautiful pink sky of dusk. I was lying down on some strange, soft things. I looked to my side closely and became confused, "…feathers? This isn't my bed… ugh… I feel like I've been asleep for weeks…" A cool breeze flowed over me. A heard a strange motion of wind, and suddenly I was faced with a giant, spiky, yellow-feathered wing rising up, one on each side of me. I nervously shot up and looked forward, my eyes suddenly grew wide with awe and disbelief…

A giant head, with the same yellow feathers turned sideways so I can see it's piercing, black eye, and it's long, pointed beak. The mighty beast let a loud screeching "ZAAAAAAAAAA" sound! Terrified, I looked down, away from the beast only to be facing, what appeared to be a mile long drop to the ground!

"AAH!" I nearly jumped out of my skin. As if instinctively, I immediately got down on my belly and wrapped my arms around the giant bird's head.

"You desire more from life than what you currently have, do you not?" a mysterious voice called out from seemingly nowhere.

"Who said that?!" I yelled out, terrified.

"I did" the beast turned it's head towards me, and it's eyes showed warmth and calmness, "…do not be frightened that you can understand me… please focus on the question at hand. Do you desire a… different life?"

"How… I don't understand… what's going on?"

"The world you know of is not the one you are meant to be in. Do you wish to throw your old life away and live in your true home world?"

"What do you mean 'home world'? I'm on Earth, aren't I?"

"In a way, yes, but the Earth you belong on is different from the one you live in. Hurry, the time is near to make your choice…" the bird nudged it's head forward at what seemed to be a giant wall in the middle of the sky."

"Can't you just fly around that?!"

"No, unless you choose to go. Otherwise, you will be smashed into that wall. Even I am unaware of what happens to you after that. You may return to your old life, or you may die from the impact of the wall. And if the wall doesn't kill you, the drop will."

"Gah! Okay, okay! I'll go, please, just don't let me die!!"

"You have made the wiser decision… just keep holding on to me like you already are and whatever you do, don't let go…" the massive yellow bird suddenly picked up speed and headed straight for the wall! I gripped tighter.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh…ohhhh!" I yelled as the bird suddenly shot straight upward seconds before hitting the wall. I gripped on for dear life, I tell ya! I was so scared that I blacked out again.

Once again, I woke up somewhere different. This time, I was in a rather large room, with a small window on the wall on one side of my bed, and a desk with a lamp, a clock, and a notebook on the other. I glanced over at the clock and looked at the time and date, 3:33PM, February 9, 2002. "February… 9th?! I've been asleep for almost a day! What a weird dream… but wait? I must still must be asleep, cause I'm still not in my bed…"

"What are you talking about? Are you talking to me?" a soft, female voice called out to me.

"Huh? Uh no, sorry, I thought I was alone in here…" I replied as I rubbed my head tiredly. Strange… my arm and head both felt… different. I sounded different too, a bit higher pitched.

"Don't be silly, I always sleep by you, to protect you, Zai."

"Uh… thanks? Wait, what did you call me? Who are you?" then I made the biggest mistake of the day, I threw the blanket off of me and looked down at the floor beside the bed. And came face to muzzle with a Ninetales. A real live Ninetales. She looked just like I thought a Ninetales would look like if it could exist in real life. I nearly fainted again, "Oh my God…" But that was nothing compared to seeing a large, orange beak coming from my face! I was frozen in fear… I couldn't move!

"What's wrong Zai?"

"I… I'm dreaming, aren't I? This place, this 'thing', and you are all just figments of my imagination right?" I started sweating nervously. I normally could tell if I'm dreaming or not, because things don't feel the same when I dream. Everything seems quieter in them. But this felt as real as anything.

"I guess that fight yesterday took a lot of you. You're still dazed!"

"Dazed? No way, this is too real for me to be dazed…" I leapt out of bed and looked down at myself. I was a Zapdos… sorta! I still had a human shaped body, but all the features were Zapdos like! My feet, they stuck out far in front and behind me. They were like bird's feet only bigger, with three long, scaly, clawed toes in the front, and one in the back. I was wearing a night shirt and pants, but I went into the closest room, which luckily was a bathroom, and quickly removed them to look at the rest of my body, which was hard, because of my new tail getting in the way of taking off my pants, which seemed to have been custom made with a tail hole.

My entire body was covered in soft yellow feathers, from my head, all the way down to the grayish area where the tall, long feet started. My arms were covered in them, too, though, they were all around spikier than the rest, and were pushed back towards my shoulders. My fingers were each a feather, though, a bit tougher and flexible, like human fingers. I looked in the closest mirror and saw my head and face. My head… oh boy, it looked just like a Zapdos head! Though, instead of the feathers on the back of my head standing out in all different directions, they were pushed back mainly, as if I had combed them back. Additionally, my beak was a bit shorter in comparison to a normal Zapdos beak. I could see behind my body, and look at the short, spiky tail feathers that had sprouted from my back.

"H-how… what… why? So, none of that was a dream? Is this the new life I was told about?" I just kept staring in shock at myself in the mirror, trying to piece everything together, "okay, so I've been awakened to a new world. Pokemon are real and can speak English, I'm a Zapdos-human thing, and apparently…" I hear the sound of gentle winter waves from an ocean hitting the side of a wall, "…I'm living in some coastal area now."

After repeating those lines over a few times, I stepped out of the bathroom, only to have Ninetales screech at me.

"Eeeep! Zai, you're not decent! Put some clothes on!" She ran into the other room. I looked through a few random drawers in the room, and eventually found some decent looking clothes. I had a bit of difficulty getting the clothes on with my large beak in the way of the shirt, and my tail for the pants, which it turns out, I have both holed and non-holed pairs of, so I had to look at about three different pairs before I found a holed pair.

After that whole mess was over and done with, I looked around the place I had apparently been staying at, and it was very spacious, but fairly well decorated. It was like I was living in a warehouse. I decided that it was time for some answers.

"So, uhm, Miss Ninetales…"

"Zai, what's wrong with you today? You woke up late, you're freaking out over everything, and since when am I a "Miss"? You've always called me Ninetales or Nine, since the day you evolved me from Vulpix, so many years ago."

"_Good," _I thought,_ "that's one question down, but it just brings up many more…" _"So, you're my own Pokemon…"

"You're one and only, of course!"

"Wait, you're my only one?"

"Yup, you got me when I was but a baby Vulpix, as a gift from…. your mother when you first became aware of your hybrid form, don't you remember? You once told me the whole story when I was old enough"

"Hybrid form? Aware?" I shook my head, "okay, Ninetales, I'll tell you what. I think I have amnesia, and I can't remember a few things right now. I'm just gonna ask you a few questions until my memory is jogged, okay?"

"Okay, Zai, no problem…"

"First of all, why do you keep calling me Zai? Isn't my name Michael?"

"Well, yeah, in your human form you're named Michael Avia. But in your hybrid form, you've always called yourself Zai Dos, at least, as far back as I can remember. It's your nickname."

"Okay, well, what do you mean "human form"? Do you mean I can turn back into a human? How?! …Avia? Oh well, sounds a lot better than my real last name…"

"Yes, and you can remain that way for almost a week without reverting back."

"Reverting back? You mean this is my 'real' form?"

"Well, yeah, I mean, you told me most form shifting hybrids adapt their hybrid form as their normal one, around the age of 7 or 8. To answer your previous question, all you have to do is focus on what your human form looks like and you should shift back easily… I mean, you do it all the time… I don't know how you could forget all of this. It's like you're not even you."

"Well," I thought deep for a moment and then shook my head. I figured it would be better to have my own questions answered before I raise questions from others, "anyway, where am I?"

"In Olivine Harbor… you know, In New Jersey? Close to New York City?"

Okay, Olivine Harbor… no such place in New Jersey… but wait, if Pokemon are real, then maybe some things like names and such have been changed to be closer to the Pokemon World.

"Alright, I get it, but… why am I here? Do I actually live here?"

"Well, yeah. This abandoned warehouse is where we went to settle down by ourselves after… you know…"

"No, I don't know, in fact, I don't know any of this. It all feels familiar, but my mind refuses to remember it."

"Then maybe it'd be best if you didn't remember it right now… you told me not to bring it up before…" I thought hard about it and decided it would be best if I didn't find out. I'm in a different world now, with different people. My mom and brother aren't even here probably but back on the other world. Whoever must have been here in my place has a problem with their mom. Though, when Ninetales brought it up, I couldn't help but get a sad sinking feeling hearing about it.

"Okay, so let me get this straight, my name is Michael Avia or Zai Dos. I'm living on my own, at the age of 14, in an abandoned warehouse in Olivine Harbor, New Jersey. I'm a Zapdos hybrid who can become a human form, and I own only one Pokemon, you. And, somehow, you can speak human English."

"Yeah, that's pretty much it, Zai. Except, I'm not speaking your language. Most hybrids can just understand us Pokemon in their hybrid form. Normally when you're human you can't understand me, unless I point something out to you."

"Okay, that's all… I think I need some time to myself, okay?"

"Alright, I hope your memories come back soon, Zai. I miss the old you."

My tail feathers twitched up a bit as Ninetales went into the other room. I decided to try shifting. I went into the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. I was amazed at what had become of me, but now wasn't the time to stare in awe at myself again. If I wanted to go outside, and talk to other people, I figured a hybrid would freak them out, so I should try shifting back to, what I hopefully thought, would be my old self. I guess I HAD done it before, because within seconds of closing my eyes and concentrating, I felt a tingle through my body. I felt the smooth, pointy feathers sliding into my skin, my beak became shorter an softer until it became a normal human nose and mouth, my feet shrunk and became less twig-like, as the back toe moved to the front, and the final, fifth toe had somehow appeared out of seemingly nowhere.

After the tingling stopped, I opened my eyes and looked in the mirror. Normal, old, everyday me. I breathed a sigh of relief, when I checked my body out. Everything appeared to be normal and all my clothes were fine… except for the large tail hole in the back of my pants. I left the bathroom and went to put a more human-friendly pair of pants on.

"Ninetales! I'm going outside for a while!" I yelled into the other room.

"Niiiine!" she replied. Guess she was right about the language thing.

I stepped outside and got a good look around. It was quite cold and quite empty, but then again, this area WAS supposedly abandoned. I prayed that it wasn't far to town, but luckily, "Olivine Center", as it was known as, was only a short walk from the harbor. I was quite surprised when I reached town.

"Hey, Zai! How's it going?"

"Hey, it's Mr. Dos! Been a week since you've been to town!"

"Huh? Zai, you barely ever walk around in your human form"

Random people from the streets and shops were greeting me! And they somehow knew I was a hybrid! And apparently, I wasn't alone. In addition to the not too surprising Pokemon various people were playing and working with, there were also teenage and even adult hybrids talking and shopping! I tried not to stare, but I was so interested in the hybrids and Pokemon! A real live Sandslash, Growlithe, and even a Kadabra! And then the hybrids… there were several Eevee hybrids, a Charizard, a Gardevoir, even a Ninetales hybrid!

I was shocked to beyond belief. Not only did I apparently belong in this world, but I also fit right in among the population! After sorting everything out, I decided to head back, since I didn't have any money on me to buy any food. As I was walking back, I saw a team of Wartortle and Mudkip Pokemon and hybrids helping each other put out a fire that had broken on the edge of town through use of their Water Guns. I put my hand to my forehead and then pinched my arm to make absolute sure that this just wasn't some unusually long dream. I didn't wake up again in my bed in my room. Even after that, I still wasn't sure that I wasn't dreaming, but I was sure about one thing. I'm definitely not on the same planet I was yesterday.

* * *

And so, that's how it all began. Of course, that still leaves a lot to be explained, like, what exactly happened to me over the next three years of my new life and when and how did I meet Xavier, Seraph, Chris, Rick, and the rest. But those adventures, I'm afraid, will have to wait until next time. 


	2. Chapter 1

**The Zapdos' Journey**

**_Chapter 1: _Revival of the Electric Spirit**

_Oh, hey everyone. Welcome back. So, my story of how I came over to this world was interesting? Well, if you thought that was all there was to it, then you don't know the half of it. Heh, but you guys knew that, right? I don't think I would just go from being confused and surprised to being the mysteriously cool and collected guy you know me as today, right? Well, let me start from where I left off, then…_

_Date: _**February 9, 2002**

_As far back as we can re-… oh wait, I said that already. Ahem, moving on…_

"Zai? Zai, you overslept again!"

"grrrhn, huh?" I arose groggily from my bed just as I had the day before. I was still in the warehouse and I had somehow turned back into my hybrid form in my sleep, so I finally gave in mentally to the fact that this was definitely no dream. I looked over to my side to see Ninetales sitting patiently next to the bed.

"It's 10AM already… you might not go to school anymore, but you still made a resolution to wake up earlier, remember? Why don't you try to set your alarm next time to wake you up? Or is your memory still messed up?"

"Memory? Yeah, it is, I'm afraid. Sorry, Ninetales… I'll remember that now, though, so I won't oversleep again." I said, of course, this was untrue since I always oversleep, even back in the other world. "…wait, I don't go to school anymore?"

"Yup! You don't really have a need to anymore. You know the basics of living and have survived on your own just fine for years. You've been making money off of doing odd jobs for people here and there, not to mention getting some free food and stuff from saving a person or hybrid here or there."

"Saving people? Like a hero?" I blushed slightly. I never thought that I, of all people, would be a hero.

"Don't let it go to your head! You never did. In fact, you barely ever show a lot of emotion. This is the most lively you've been since we moved here."

"Oh… hey, I'm sorry if I'm being difficult, but I honestly can't remember anything from before yesterday."

"It's okay, Zai…" she jumped up into my lap and nuzzled against me, "I'm here for you after all, just as you are here for me. It's always been that way, for me at least, and I hope it can be that way for you, whether you remember things or not." I gaped; I couldn't believe such a deeply touching statement came from my own pet!

"Don't worry, Ninetales… it will always be the way it is now, no matter what." I said gently as I stroked her long golden mane. My train of thought was suddenly interrupted by what seemed like a flash of light in my head. "The generator! I have to recharge it today, don't I? Otherwise, we'd have to actually have to pay for electricity, eh?"

"Yeah it is, but Zai, how did you know that?"

"Uhm… that's… a good question actually! It just suddenly appeared in my mind. Maybe my memories are starting to come back to me, finally!" I shook my head. I had actually received a memory of well… my new life, apparently. It instantly brought more and more questions to mind. Will I recover all of my memories? Will I forget my old life? Do I really want to remember my old life? I mean, my mom and brother are both gone… I decided not to think about it right now. It's too much to wake up on. "Anyway, let's not worry about that, now, where's the generator, Ninetales, and how do we recharge it?"

Ninetales nudged her head over to a door to the left end of the room. "It's in there, and as for charging it, well I don't know, if only one of us could generate electricity, maybe!" she said somewhat sarcastically, but then shook her head, "sorry, I forgot that you may not even know about your powers."

"Powers? You mean I can use the abilities of a Zapdos, too?" my eyes went wide with excitement.

"Of course, since you pretty much are one anyway. You need to be in your hybrid form to use them, though, like you are now."

My mind seemed to be overtaken by the urge to test out these powers. I knew what a Zapdos was capable of in a mere game, but now it could all be real! I had always dreamed of being able to have some control over electricity. I tried to hide and calm my racing mind, but Ninetales could see my tell-all expression. "If you're so anxious to try that all out, why don't you go try charging the generator? I'll wait here for you."

"What? I don't know how to do it, remember?"

"Oh yeah, sorry. Well, I don't know really, I'm not a Zapdos like you are. When I want to shoot fire I have to breathe a certain way. I'm guessing that when you want to generate electricity out of you, you have to concentrate on a certain part of your body."

"You really think it'll work?"

"Eh, maybe. Why don't you try it on the generator? We won't be getting any lighting or energy to run appliances if we don't recharge it once a week." I nodded in agreement and got up as I headed to the room on the opposite side of the bathroom.

The room was pretty small and cramped. It was barely large enough to have me fit inside of it, mainly because of the giant machine taking up the rest of the space. The generator had a giant cable running into the wall and was producing a low humming sound.

"So this is the generator, huh? I guess this is where I have to recharge it" I said as I noticed a small panel on the side with a picture resembling my feathered hand. I nervously placed my hand on the panel, and quickly thought to myself, "I hope this works. What's the worst that can happen? I can kill myself, that's what can happen. Then I'll never find out what really happened to me and the 'me' in this world… but I can't NOT do this, or else I'll never get used to life here. Okay, then! Here goes…"

I closed my eyes and concentrated on my hand, as I had often thought one would do to try this. I imagined a flow of electricity coming from the center of my body, moving towards my hand and out onto the panel. Without warning or anything, I suddenly heard a crackling noise, and my eyes shot open to see that the electricity was just flowing easily from my hand, and I barely felt anything! I realized that it must be so easy for me because my body, at least, was a natural at producing electricity.

Within seconds, a bar on the generator had completely filled signaling a full charge. I pulled my hand back and thought of the flow stopping. Thankfully, the energy stopped flowing. I walked out of the room happily, knowing now just what I was capable of. Ninetales sat waiting for me.

"Well…?"

"It was awkward at first, but I've think I got the basics down now."

"Still got a long way to go, though. You used to be able to do all sorts of things with your electricity."

"Really? Like… what?"

"Make shapes, bending the electricity and such. Basically controlling the flow of it. You used to be able to concentrate it to such a small and compressed area that it was almost like a solid object."

"Hmm… well… the basis of using my power is concentration, so maybe if I just focus on the electricity doing those things, it'll happen."

I walked outside. It was surprisingly warm, and then I remembered that I was still in hybrid form so I had a whole layer of feathers around my skin now. Ninetales followed by my side. I looked out at the harbor, watching the restless waters dance in the mid-February wind. Ninetales nudged me.

"Are we going somewhere?" she questioned. I shook my head.

"Nah, I wanna try these powers out." I said, in an excited tone.

"Just don't overwork yourself… it may feel like it takes nothing, but it drains your physical strength if you exert too much energy."

"_Okay then, it's just like Power Points from the games. Use it too much and you can't anymore until energy is restored."_ I thought to myself. Hey, it seemed like a good comparison… to me at least. Er… anyway, moving along. "Don't worry, I'm sure I'll know if I get tired."

"Sometimes you'd train so hard, you'd fall unconscious for a day… that's why I worry."

"Well, I promise I won't try doing anything like that, okay?" I kneeled down and stroked her ears a bit, "it's really sweet of you to care, though, thanks." Ninetales licked my feathers.

"It's no problem; after all, it's what I do." She replied.

"Ok, then…" I rubbed my feathered hands together in preparation, "let's do this." I held out my hand upwards and focused like before. It was much easier this time. With a cracking sound, several bolts of lightning leaped out of my hand and shot out into the sky. I concentrated again, this time, on the bolts looping in two circles before heading out to the great beyond. Sure enough, the lightning bolts shot out of my hand, head towards the sky and circled around a small area before disappearing.

"Cool…" I said, a bit shocked at what I was doing, "This is awesome! I wonder what else I can do… hmm." I focused, harder this time, on the electricity staying within a smaller area. It took a couple of tries, but I eventually managed to get the electricity to constantly loop back to my hand so that it wouldn't spread far. Within the day, I was able to create basic shapes with this ability. I was amazed with each shape I created. Like a little child, going "ooo" and "aah" at every little thing.

Eventually Ninetales nudged me again.

"Hey, it's getting late. We've been out here all day, let's go inside and get something to eat." She said as she headed back inside and into the kitchen.

"Hmm? Yeah alright. I am getting quite tired, actually. What do you want for dinner?"

"Well, what do you want?"

"I've always liked that spicy fried chick…" I stopped there. I thought about the delicious spicy fried chicken my mom always used to make me, and my stomach churned. I felt like I was going to throw up!

"What were you saying, Zai?" Ninetales asked as she turned around and saw me holding my stomach. "Are you alright!" I felt queasy for a few more seconds but it quickly subsided.

"Yeah," I replied a bit tiredly, "I just got sick off of the image of eating another bird. I guess it's cannibalism to me now…" I shook my head and thought of what I could eat. "hmm, I got it! How about sushi?"

"Again? But you just had that three days ago! In fact, you eat it almost every day." Ninetales said, somewhat angrily.

"Really? Sorry, it's just that it's always been my favorite food, heh."

"Trust me, I know."

"Right, so, sushi it is then?"

"I'll just eat that prepackaged chow over there. I honestly like it better than raw fish… yuck."

"Oh… well, alright, more for me then! Uhm… now where to go to buy sushi?"

"You have all of the supplies you need in the fridge… you normally make it yourself."

"Really?" I said as I went over and got the package of food and poured it into a bowl for Ninetales, "you mean I actually make my own sushi?"

"Yeah, and you've apparently gotten very good at it. Whenever people come to visit you, they always ask you for some. I honestly don't know what you guys see in that stuff…" she muttered to herself as she dragged the bowl by her teeth into the bedroom and sat in front of the couch. I went over to the fridge, and was about to open the door when I remembered I was still in hybrid form. I quickly ran into my room and changed back, clothes and form-wise, then headed back to the kitchen. I took the supplies for a Tuna Roll out of the fridge… or at least it looks like tuna… at the moment I only instinctively thought it was that. I looked at the stuff in front of me.

"Uhm, okay." I was drawing a blank. I had never made sushi before. I could only guess how to make it. I reached for the seaweed, when suddenly I had another flash. "Ah! I know how to do this now!" I exclaimed quite loudly.

"Tale… ni-ni!" Ninetales yelled from the other room. Almost without any thinking, I managed to assemble a traditional 6-piece "tuna" roll.

"Awesome!" I took the first bite. If my taste buds could speak, they'd be singing at that moment! It was, without a doubt, the best roll of sushi I had ever eaten. I didn't know if it was the rice, the raw fish, or the seaweed, but it was delicious! "Oh, so good… mmm…" I said some more things of that general nature, and then went to my room.

I sat next to Ninetales who was busy with her bowl of food. I patted her head again, and then looked up to see something I had previously ignored... the television. I was almost afraid to turn it on. I know that as soon as I did, all of this new world programming would be on and it would introduce me to so much of this world's troubles, event, and the like. At the moment, I felt I should just live with what I have, to make things less overwhelming. But then again, I also felt bored, and boredom means TV time!

I hit the power button on the remote and started flipping. Everything looked almost the same! Jeopardy! on one channel, Seinfeld on another (of course, it was a bit different because of all of the Pokemon related jokes). This, that, more random stuff I would never watch in the old world… hmm, news, which I quickly flipped passed after hearing something about a crazy guy who tried robbing a television studio months earlier.

Of course, I flipped Seinfeld back on for a while and watched that. I guess that's one thing to count on. Even in this crazy, new, alternate world, television is still the same old thing. After that was over I flipped the TV off and went over to my dresser by the bed and looked through the contents of each drawer. One drawer just had clothes. Another had some writing utensils, like paper, pencils, pens, and the like. Another had my underwear, most of which had been cleaned. The bottom drawer had a small box in it.

I took the box out and tried opening the top, until I realized that it was locked shut. I looked around the drawer for the key, but to no avail.

"I must have put something really important in here to have locked it and hid the key… now if only I knew where I hid it." I shrugged. I put the box back in the drawer. "I'd look for it, but I'm exhausted after all I did today. Guess Ninetales was right about the energy thing…" I sighed to myself as I shifted back into hybrid form, slipped into my night clothes, and got settled into bed. "Hey Ninetales, I'm going to bed, alright?"

"Alright Zai, goodnight!" Ninetales said, quite cheerfully. She ran up and climbed on to the foot of the bed. She curled her nine luxurious tails around herself and drifted off. I, however, just laid in my bed for hours looking at the wall, thinking to myself.

"How did I get here? Why did I come here? What happened to the old world? My friends, my family… where are you? What was in that box? Will my memory of this life eventually override my old one?" I couldn't think of a possibly answer for any of these questions. At least right now. As I started to finally doze off, I dreamed about the end of my time in the other world. About the seemingly normal school day, about getting shocked, about the adapter… and the virus…

"the virus…" I muttered as I finally drifted off to sleep, knowing that tomorrow I would be determined to find some answers.

_Well, that's all for now. I can't just remember all of this stuff like that, y'know? I'm sure that by next time, I'll probably have a month's worth of memories to talk about!_


	3. Chapter 2

**The Zapdos' Journey**

**_Chapter 2: _Answers Revealed and Questions Asked From the Internet**

_Recalling all of this information is a lot harder than I thought and the longer I take, the more I seem to forget. I guess I just have a bad memory. The memories of my past life still linger on in my mind though, and I doubt they'll ever go away. Anyway, no time to think about it now!_

_Date: _**February 10, 2002**

Drip, drop, drip, drop… Shhhhhhhhhhhhhh…

The sound that woke me up the next morning was the sound a lightly falling late winter shower. I got up rather quickly and looked at the clock. It was barely 6AM… Ninetales was still fast asleep at the foot of my bed. I got up gently, as not to awake her, and walked to the kitchen. I changed back to human form, which was becoming less and less creepy as I grew accustomed to it and had a bowl of cereal. I almost felt like I was back home, sitting there eating cereal as if nothing had happened.

Afterwards, I poured Ninetales her food and set in front of the bed for when she wakes up. I sat on the couch, and just looked at the ceiling for a while. I thought to myself quietly.

"_There's got to be some way I can find answers as to what happened… but how? Where can I look? Who can I turn to? This whole thing happened because of that error I had gotten back in the other world. That virus… it was the same name as the story I had read… it took place in a world just like this actually. The author… I had only talked to him online once through a site to tell him how much I loved his story… his pen name was FireHybrid._"

I suddenly had an idea and I instantly sat up excitedly.

"_What if I can reach him on the Internet? What if I can find news about a recent massive outbreak of amnesia or something and then talk to one of the other victims? What if some of my friends are still there! Oh man, I have to get to a computer!"_

I got up and looked around… my heart sunk when I saw no hint of a computer anywhere.

"Wonderful, great, yeah…" I said disappointedly. Ninetales stirred from her sleep and looked at me. I looked at her and shook my head. "Sorry I woke you…"

"Ni…" she replied… she didn't seem to mind much.

I went into the bathroom and shifted back to hybrid form and got dressed. Afterwards, I went back into the main room to find Ninetales chomping away at her food already.

"Hey, Ninetales, do I have a computer?" She looked up at me, her muzzle covered in food.

"Yeah, you do… it's in the closet. That's why there's a chair in front of it. You turned the closet into a little computer area to keep your CDs and games and stuff, as well as store the hardware in the back of it to reduce the amount of space it takes up. At least, that's what you told me," She laughed a bit then sighed, "still can't remember stuff?"

"Yeah… I guess it'll be like this for a while, huh?" I said with a frown, "I promise I'll recover my memory eventually… but right now it's internet time!" I said excitedly, even though I knew the point of going online was to help me find answers to at least a few of my questions. I ran to the closet and opened the door to find the computer sitting right there behind it.

"_It kinda looks like the one I've always used… wait a sec... it's the exact same computer!_" I thought to myself as I sat down and turned it on. I realized that I had to shift back to human form again, since it was a little hard to type in hybrid form. Anyway, same old Windows 98, same old login screen, save for the fact that my main login was now Zai. My account had no background, except for the blue screen. All the basic icons were there, MS Word, Recycle Bin, MS Paint, My Computer, My Documents, AIM… wha?

"I have AIM? I never had that before…" my sign on name was automatically displayed and it seemed that I had it save my password, since no one else uses this computer. I signed on, but it seemed that my Buddy List was empty. Guess I didn't use AIM that much myself. I loaded up Internet Explorer, which seemed to run a lot faster, and it opened to the default homepage. Nothing in the news section that looked like much help, so I ran search for recent news about an amnesia outbreak. Nothing… I checked my e-mail account, which thankfully, was also saved on the computer, since it now had been changed. Nothing in my inbox or in any of my folders… unbelievable! Then again, it wasn't much different in my old life. I pretty much never got e-mails.

"Well… this doesn't help me at all… what was I thinking?" I sighed to myself. I checked a few random websites, looking for any sort of clue, but everything came up negative.

Feeling defeated, I went to AIM to check the options for it. After finding the option to create a public chat, I had an idea. "I doubt this'll work, but…" I created a chat room using the name of FireHybrid's story, A New Beginning. "Now I play the waiting game, I guess…" I thought to myself. I got up from the chair and walked over to the fridge. "Hmm… oh. Vanilla Coke! This stuff hasn't even been out long and I love it." I said a bit happily, grabbing a can from the fridge. _Hey, it was new at the time this occurred, at least._ I walked back to the computer, opening the can and drinking as I sat down. As the cold, vanilla flavored fluid hit my tongue, I was relieved to be reminded that some things are still the same, like my favorite foods and stuff.

I waited in that chat room for a few hours. It seemed hopeless to think that someone would show up, so I reached over at the mouse to close the window when suddenly, someone by the name of Mel had entered the room. Surprised, I quickly highlighted the text box and start typing:

Zai: Hello, is there something I can do for you? My name's Zai.

Mel: Hey there, my name's Melchior, but you can call me Mel. I saw this chat room was named A New Beginning, so I was wondering if it had anything to do with FireHybrid's story.

Zai: So there ARE others that know? Please, I just woke up in this world the other day, and I don't know what's going on! Can you please help me?

Mel: Well, to be honest, I don't know myself. I haven't found out much you probably don't already know and I honestly can't remember what happened before I started life here.

Zai: Wait, so you have no memory of what your life in the other world was like? That's strange… I have a perfect recollection of what my old life was like…

Mel: My mind's pretty much been a blank since I came over here, I mean I know some things, like the story, but not much. I've been here for a little while already, and you just came over, you say?

Zai: Yeah… I came online to try to find clues to what happened.

Mel: I've already tried that numerous times, and each time I came up empty. But maybe if we cooperate, we can find something.

Zai: That's a good idea. If anything, it'll clear up if FireHybrid is really here with us or not.

For the next couple of hours or so, we did searches on ever search engine we could think of, looking for things about FireHybrid, which didn't help much, and "A New Beginning" which helped even less, since thousands of websites used that term in it. After a while, I thought back to the one time I had talked to him… what did he say? Thank you for the comments… something about a new story… uhm… I told him I lived in New Jersey and he said he didn't live that far away…

"Maybe if I search for a record of him living in New York or something", I thought out loud. I went to a search engine and searched for FireHybrid and New York. Nothing, but, it gave me a correction suggestion. There was no record of a FireHybrid in New York, but someone named… Fire Storm? It wasn't a big article, but it said something about a Growlithe hybrid, supposedly called Fire Storm, and his Arcanine hybrid partner had busted a scam by a local group of criminals in an area near a town named Sapphire.

Something in my head suddenly went off, call it a bird's intuition I guess, but I knew he was the guy I was looking for.

Zai: Hey, Mel, I found something. It doesn't say anything about a FireHybrid, but I have this weird… I guess instinct, that I know that this guy… it's him. He apparently doesn't live that far away so I'll attempt to meet him.

Mel: Are you sure that's wise? Meeting him out of the blue like that?

Zai: I need to do this. I need answers. Maybe he can give them to me. I'll try to mention your amnesia to him, too.

Mel: Well, if you think it'll help you, go ahead!

Zai: Thanks, Mel, I'm going to go get ready for my journey ahead of me. I'll talk to you again sometime!

Mel: Sure thing and good luck, Zai!

For the rest of the day I searched out routes from here to Sapphire Town, ate dinner, and took a shower. I turned into my hybrid form once more and got ready for bed. Right before I got in the bed, I turned to Ninetales.

"Ninetales… in a couple days, we're going on a long journey." I said. Ninetales looked up at me curiously.

"Where to, Zai?" she asked. I grinned widely and said loudly,

"To a place in New York… Sapphire Town!"


End file.
